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S38BS0 







a 







The Oil-Bearing Shales 


OF THE 


Coast of Brazil 


BY 


JOHN C. BRANNER, 


STANFORD UNIVERSITY, CAL. 




A Paper read before the American Institute of Mining 
Engineers, at the Canadian Meeting, 

August, 1900. 




AUTHOR’S EDITION. 

1 900. 

P r 

A y 








































The Oil-Bearing Shales of the Coast of Brazil. 


BY JOHN C. BRANNER, STANFORD UNIVERSITY, CAL. 
(Canadian Meeting, August, 1900.) 


Shales rich in oil are found at several places along the coast 
of Brazil. The material has been prospected at several places, 
and samples have been examined and reported upon by com¬ 
petent authorities. So far as I am acquainted with them, these 
oil-bearing beds are of Tertiary age. A glimpse at the dis¬ 
tribution and character of the Tertiary rocks of the region 
should give as some idea of the possible distribution of these 
oil-bearing shales. Tertiary rocks skirt the northeast coast 
of Brazil from the northern part of the State of Espirito Santo 
almost or quite to the Amazon valley. Here and there this 
narrow strip is cut in two by the encroachment of the sea, and 
the underlying gneisses, granites or other crystalline rocks are 
exposed upon the beach. In other places, the Tertiary belt 
widens out until it is 80 kilometers or more in width. Fig. 1 
is a sketch-map of a part of the coast-area referred to. 

Along the coast from Prado, in the State of Bahia, north¬ 
ward to Natal, there is a line of bluffs from 15 to 90 meters 
high, interrupted here and there by stream-valleys. As seen 
from the sea, these bluffs are rather conspicuous and highly 
colored yellow, brown, red, white, black, and purple. These 
colors are often so mingled as to give the beds a mottled or 
parti-colored appearance. Fig. 2 shows a characteristic bit of 
the coast in the State of Parahyba do Norte. In some places, 
especially in the southern part of the State of Sergipe, and in 
the northern part of Rio Grande do Norte, the immediate 
coast is covered with sand-dunes. Here and there these sand- 
dunes have been carried inland over the top of the Tertiary 
beds, and the subsequent encroachment of the sea has exposed 
the Tertiary rocks again, where they form the bases of the 
bluffs. This is well shown in Fig. 3, from a photograph taken 
at Bahia Formosa, on the coast of Rio Grande do Norte. 


Fig. 1. 



The width of the Tertiary 
belt has been determined at 
several places. Owing partly 
to the fact that the landward 
margin of the beds is generally 
more or less ragged, and partly 
to the lack of good maps, these 
measurements must be ac¬ 
cepted as only approximately 
correct: 

1. From Porto Alegre, just 
south of Caravellas in southern 
Bahia, along the Rio Mucury 
to the Serra dos Aymores, 80 
kilometers. This does not in¬ 
clude the Abrolhos islands of 
the coast, which are also Eo¬ 
cene Tertiary. 

2. At Ilheos, Bahia, there 
are no sedimentary beds; the 
crystalline rocks appear on the 
shore. 

3. At Camamu, 22 kilome¬ 
ters. 

4. From Bahia to the west¬ 
ern margin of the series near 
Nazareth, 50 kilometers. 

5. From Bahia in the direc¬ 
tion of Feira de Santa Anna, 
82 kilometers. 

6. Across the axis of the 
basin at Alagoinhas, Bahia, 80 
kilometers. 

7. From Aracaju to the 
Serra dTtabaianinha, 80 kilo¬ 
meters. 

8. Along the Rio Sao Fran¬ 
cisco from its mouth to Pro¬ 
pria, 60 kilometers. 

9. FromMaceio toCachoeira 
along the Alagoas railway, 33 
kilometers. 

10. At Pedra do Conde, 








































THE OIL-BEARING SHALES OF THE COAST OF BRAZIL. 


3 


south of Tamandare 0 kilometers; granite is exposed on the 
beach. 

11. At the mouth of Rio Formoso, State of Pernambuco, 3 
kilometers. 

12. At Cape Santo Agostinlio, Pernambuco, 0 kilometers ; 
granites and porphyries on the beach. 

13. At Pernambuco along the Great Western of Brazil rail¬ 
way, the granite is exposed J kilometer above Macacos; 7 kilo¬ 
meters. 

14. On the Central de Pernambuco railway the inland mar¬ 
gin of the Tertiary is about kilometer 10, two kilometers 
above Tigipio. On the Recife ao Sao Francisco railway the 
Tertiary beds are not exposed, the first recognizable beds 
being crystalline rocks at Cabo, kilometer 31. 

15. At Parahyba do ISTorte on the Conde d’Eu railway, 30 
kilometers. 

16. At the Rio Grande do jN"orte the FTatal aRova Cruz rail¬ 
way does not cut square across the Tertiary, but runs southward 
parallel with the coast and on Tertiary beds for most of its 
length. It crosses the Matahu river on the gneiss, so that the 
Tertiary varies in width here from 15 to 50 kilometers. 

At Bahia, Tertiary beds are let down by a fault behind a 
narrow strip of crystalline rock which, northeast of that city 
for many kilometers, separates them from the ocean. 

In my work upon the stone and coral reefs of Brazil, a trip 
was made on foot along the beach from Pernambuco to Maceio, 
in the State of Alagoas. This trip afforded an excellent oppor¬ 
tunity for seeing the best exposures of these rocks to be found 
in the country. 

The series to which the oil-shales belong is exposed in many 
places about Cape Santo Agostinlio, Rio Formoso, Tamandare, 
Abreu de Una and Maragogy; but at these places the un¬ 
weathered shales were not found. 

Going south from Pernambuco, the oil-bearing shales were 
first found upon the beach just south of the mouth of Rio 
Maragogy, 9° 3' S. latitude, in the State of Alagoas. At this 
place they are uncovered at low tide and extend seaward for a 
few hundred meters, forming a wave-cut bench. They are also 
exposed in the bank above the reach of high tide. The beds 
are more or less wrinkled, and a small syncline is plainly shown 


4 THE OIL-BEARING SHALES OF THE COAST OF BRAZIL. 

upon the bench at low tide. The dips observed are 10° S. 71° 
AY., and 6° S. 31° AY., magnetic. The shales all dip landward 
and beneath the red and mottled beds exposed in the cliffs or 
line of hills that follow along close to and parallel with the 
coast at this place. 

Between the mouth of Rio Maragogy and the village of Sao 
Bento, at a venda called Carnaxo, the sea has cut into a bed of 
heavy conglomerate rocks that underlie the shale beds. Im¬ 
mediately south of these conglomerates, black shales are 
exposed at low water. These shales contain many finely broken 
plant-remains. The dips of the shales at this locality vary as 
follows: 9° S. 60° AY., 4° S. 80° AY., 4° S. 33° AY., 10° S. 
50° AY., all magnetic. 

It is noticeable in all these cases that the dips carry the rocks 
downward toward the hills that follow the coast-line. 

At Japaratuba, just south of the mouth of a small stream, 
low tide exposes conglomerates, sandstones and shales, dipping 
S. 80° AY. The exposure extends seaward about 300 meters 
from the beach. 

In front of Pitingui (9° 7' S. lat.) shales are exposed at low 
tide dipping 9° N. 70° AY. and 7° due west. Just north of 
Pitingui, however, a red cliff* rises to an elevation' of something 
like 90 meters. 

There is another interesting exposure of the shales at a place 
called Barreira do Boqueirao, between one and two leagues 
north of Porto das Pedras. Here the sea has cut into the foot 
of one of the red hills and has exposed about 7 meters of 
mottled, gray and red sandstones. The shale is visible to the 
south of this exposure, partly covered by soil and vegetation 
from the hills above. The shale where exposed is about 2 meters 
thick, but it is possible that it has a thickness of 3 or 4 meters. 
Along the shore the exposure is about 100 or 150 meters long. 
The dip varies considerably both in amount (10° to 15°) and 
direction; but for the most part the dip is inland and toward 
the red hills of the coast. The hills above this particular place 
are about 60 meters high. 

At the mouth of the Rio Manguaba (sometimes called Rio 
Porto Calvo), in the edge of the town of Porto das Pedras (S. 
lat. 9° 10'), these beds are exposed again at the ferry. Here 
the rocks are mostly sandstones; but they are of the same 


THE OIL-BEARING SIIALES OF THE COAST OF BRAZIL 


5 



The Red and Mottled Cliffs, 3 kilom. N. of Traiyao, State of Parahyba do Norte. 










6 THE OIL-BEARING SHALES OF THE COAST OF BRAZIL. 



Bluffs, 200 feet High, Capped with Sand, at Bahia Formosa, State of Rio Grande do Norte. 










Wave-Cut Terrace of Oil-Shales in the Foreground. 




















8 


THE OIL-BEARING SHALES OF THE COAST OF BRAZIL. 





The Oil-Shales, 2 kilom. South of Morro de Camaragibe. 





THE OIL-BEARING SHALES OF THE COAST OF BRAZIL. 9 

series, and the shales are interhedded with them. The dip is 
southwest about 3° or 4°. 

In the bottom of the embayment south of Marcenerio, the 
shales are exposed at low water, with a coral reef overlapping* 
them, as shown in the section, Fig. 6. 

The dips observed are 10° N. 39° W., and 13° K 57° W., 
magnetic; about 185 meters south of this place the dip is 12° 
K 25° W. 

At the Barra do Passo or Barra do Camaragibe there is one 
set of exposures north of the mouth of the river off the town, 
and another a league south of there at a place called Morro de 
Camaragibe or Barreira do Morro. 

On the beach in front of the town of Barra the shales dip 
inland toward the town at an angle of from 70° to 10°, and 


Fig. 6. 



Geological Section at the Bottom of the Embayment S. of Marcenerio, Showing the 
Shales Dipping Landward and Overgrown with Coral-Reefs. 


plunge beneath the hills back of the town. A section at this 
place would be something like Fig. 7. 

The exposures on the cape just south of the Camaragibe at 
the Barreira or Morro de Camaragibe are unusually good, 
especially at low tide. 

The cliffs are from 75 to 90 meters high. The upper beds 
are the well-known red, yellow and mottled beds of the coast; 
while at the base of the bluffs and uncovered at low tide are 
the shales and sandstones dipping landward. The lower beds 
form a wave-cut terrace about 150 meters wide. At the northern 
exposure of the bluffs on the beach are many large boulders 
of pink granite, apparently washed from a basal conglomerate 
underlying the series exposed on the hills. Some of these 

























10 THE OIL-BEARING SHALES OF THE COAST OF BRAZIL. 


water-worn granite boulders (see Fig. 8) are about a meter 
in diameter. The sandstones at the base of the bluff contain 
also rolled lumps of clay. The angle of the dip of the beds is 
usually low, (from 5° to 10°). Several pits have been sunk 
about and south of the cape by an English company that 


Fig. 7. 



Section through Passo de Camaragibe, Showing the Shales Exposed Between Tides, 
and their Relation to the Mottled Beds in the Hills back of the Town. 


prospected these shales some 10 or 12 years ago. Many of the 
shale beds contain large quantities of fragments of plants, 
so finely pulverized that no recognizable forms were found. 
The exposures in the bluffs here show in a satisfactory manner 
that the mottled and highly-colored beds exposed in the cliffs 


Fig. 8. 



Section at the Morro de Camaragibe, Showing Wave-Cut Shelf of Shales, with Boulders of 

Granite. Dip somewhat exaggerated. 


along this coast are the weathered parts of the Eocene beds. 

Fig. 4 is from a photograph taken from the wave-cut 
platform of shales on the seaward side of the hill. The beds 
shown in this picture have a marked dip, and the portions 
of the rock at the base of the hill are gray and unaffected by 















THE OIL-BEARING SHALES OF THE COAST OF BRAZIL. 11 


the weather. Following the beds with the eye, one can trace 
many of the strata high up into the mottled and parti-colored 
beds that form the tops of the hills. To one near at hand, the 
transition from the unweathered to the weathered beds seems to 
be very gradual; but to one standing a hundred meters away 
from the face of the bluff there seems to be a well-defined line 
of demarkation between the gray beds below and the highly- 
colored ones above. This coloration affects all the rocks of the 
top of the bluff down to an elevation of about 4 or 5 meters 
above tide-level. In the observations made on the spot I find 
this note : “ I see absolutely no difference between this cliff 
and hundreds of others I have set down as Tertiary.” 

The company that prospected this locality for oil-shales sank 
6 pits south of the village of Barreira, one of which was 6 
meters deep. The following are the determinations made by Mr. 
Boverton Redwood of the composition of the shales taken 
from the pits at this place: 


Composition of the Camaragibe Shales. 

Non-volatile 

Volatile. 

Combustible. 

Ash. 

Per cent. 

Per cent. 

Per cent. 

30.55 

9.45 

60.0 

24.8 

4.3 

70.9 

27.1 ’ 

12.2 

60.7 

25.5 

2.2 

72.3 

7.8 

2.9 

89.3 


Two kilometers south of the village of Barreira the shales 
form a wave-cut terrace, and the beds dip west at an angle of 
10°. (See Fig. 5.) 

Going south from this locality there are several kilometers 
of the red and mottled cliffs before one reaches the Barra de 
Santo Antonio. These cliffs are the beds above the oil-shales, 
or the weathered portions of the oil-shales themselves. 

The bluffs are about 30 meters high, and the colors are 
variegated and most brilliant. Seen a distance, the colors 
seem to be due to the bedding of the rocks; but upon examine 
tion close at hand they are found to he due partly to structure 
and partly to weathering. 

The next considerable exposures of the oil-shales south of 
Santo Antonio Grande are at Riacho Doce (S. lat. 9° 36'), and 

L.ofC. 


12 


THE OIL-BEARING SHALES OF THE COAST OF BRAZIL. 


between that stream and another small one known as Gar^a 
Torta. 

The exposures at Riacho Doee are very much like the others 
mentioned above. Inland about half a kilometer from the 
beach is a steep-faced escarpment, 60 to 90 meters high, of 
highly colored beds; while on the beach itself are exposed 
shales, sandstones, and heavy conglomerates, containing large 
granite blocks. The dips taken on the beach at low tide vary 
considerably, showing that the rocks here have been much 
wrinkled. I noted also some faults and overthrusts. The 
general structure can best be shown by a section, such as is 
given in Fig. 9, which would answer for almost every one of the 


Fig. 9. 



Section at Riacho Doce, Showing the Relations of the Shales to the Conglomerates, and 

to the Cliffs West of the Village. 


exposures seen. The heavy granite blocks indicate the near 
presence, at almost all of the exposures, of the granite which 
underlies them. The shales all overlie the heavy granite con¬ 
glomerates. 

The only fossils found in these rocks thus far are diatoms, 
plant-fragments and fish-remains. The diatoms so far as ex¬ 
amined have no diagnostic value further than to show that the 
beds are of fresh-water origin, while the other plant-remains 
are so fragmentary as to be unrecognizable. The fish-remains 
have been kindly examined for me by Prof. F. A. Lucas of the 
U. S. National Museum, who finds them to belong to the genus 
Diplomystus —a genus already reported from the fresh-water 
















THE OIL-BEARING SHALES OF THE COAST OF BRAZIL. 13 


Eocene beds of Bahia,* where the fossils were collected by Mr. 
Joseph Mawson at Itacaranha, Plata form a, and Agua Comprida. 

A section made across country from the coast inland at 
almost any point shows the same geology, with only local varia¬ 
tions. In some places the shales are thicker; in others they are 
entirely wanting. 

The same company that prospected the oil-shales south of 
the Rio Camaragihe has dug several pits near the beach at 
Riacho Doce also. Boverton Redwood found the shales from 
this place to be richer in oil than those of Camaragihe district. 
The following table is taken from his report upon them :f 


Composition of the Riacho Doce Shales. 



Volatile. 

Non-Volatile 

Combustible. 

Ash. 

No. 

Per cent. 

Per cent. 

Per cent. 

1 

34.9 

1.1 

64.0 

2 

46.3 

19.5 

34.2 

3 

26.9 

8.1 

65.0 

4 

32.8 

14.6 

52.6 

5 

25.4 

10.5 

64.1 

further 

examination 

was made by Mr. 

Redwood of the 


richest of these shales (No. 2). This contained 4.7 per cent, 
of sulphur, and upon distillation yielded 44.73 gallons of crude 
oil and 19.58 gallons of ammoniacal water to the ton. Mr. 
Redwood says further, in regard to these oil-shales : 

“The presence of sulphur would not, however, be a serious drawback, if the 
crude oil were used as a liquid fuel, or as a source of gas for illuminating pur¬ 
poses. One ton of such oil would, if properly burned, afford rather more heat 
than two tons of good steam coal, and from each gallon of oil about 90 cubic feet 
of 60-candle gas could be produced. 

“ As regards the quality of the crude oil, it should be remarked that results 
obtained on the laboratory-scale of working are less satisfactory than those yielded 
when the shale is distilled on the manufacturing-scale in retorts of suitable con¬ 
struction. The difference is far greater in the case of the ammoniacal liquor, 
and a yield of probably as much as four times the quantity of sulphate of 
ammonia may be reckoned upon.” 


* “On two deep-bodied species of the clupeoid genus Diplomystus.” By A. 
Smith Woodward. Annals and Magazine of Natural History, Jan., 1895., pp. 1-2. 
“A Contribution to the Vertebrate Paleontology of Brazil.” By E. D. Cope. 
Proc. Amer. Phil. Soc., Jan., 1886, xxiii, 3-4. 

f Report on the Riacho Doce and Camaragihe Shale Deposits on the Coast of Brazil, 
near Maceio. By Boverton Bedwood and William Topley. (London, 1891.) 




14 THE OIL-BEARING SHALES OF THE COAST OF BRAZIL. 

The parti-colored beds follow the coast southward from 
Riacho Doce to the city of Maceio and beyond. 

At Maceio the lighthouse stands upon the summit of this 
same Tertiary plateau. The beds exposed in and about the 
city are all more or less mottled, and along the line of the 
railway that runs westward between the lake and the hills 
these strata are cut at several places. No fossils were found in 
these rock either at Maceio or along the line of the Alagoas 
railway. At the Instituto Archeologico e Geographico Ala- 
goano, Dr. Costa Leite, the Secretary, showed me two fossil 
fishes, said to have been found at Fernao Velho, 14 kilometers 
from Maceio. The rock containing these fossils is a limestone 
concretion closely resembling that in which the fossil fishes of 
Ceara are found. Although the rocks at the base of the hills 
at Fernao Velho are yellow, cream-colored, and gray, that is, 
not so highly colored as the beds further up the hills, I am dis¬ 
posed to think that no importance should be attached to the re¬ 
ported origin of these fossils. The Ceara fishes have been 
carried all over Brazil, as curiosities; and it is quite possible 
that these specimens came from the Ceara beds, and, through 
some accident, have appeared at Fernao Velho, or have been 
reported from there by mistake. 

The Tertiary series is crossed almost at right angles by 
the Alagoas railway. About a kilometer and a half east of 
Utinga station gray shales like those of Riacho Dfyce are 0 
exposed by the side of the railway. At several places along 
the line between E> rnao Velho and Albuquerque are heavy 
beds of water-worn crystalline rocks, which I take to be the 
basal conglomerates of the Tertiary series. One of these 
exposures is immediately east of Cachoeira, where the con¬ 
glomerate bed is about 10 meters thick. At kilometer 33 
between Cachoeira and Albuquerque, the next station, the 
sedimentary series ends, and the railway west of these runs 
over granites and other crystalline rocks only. One cannot fail 
to observe the similarity of all these sections across the Tertiary, 
so far as their main features are concerned, though this one 
from Maceio to Albuquerque is much longer than the others. 

Fig. 10 is an ideal section on the Alagoas railway. South 
of Maceio the Eocene beds are exposed about the shores of 
Lagoa Manguaba, on Rio Jiquia and on Rio Cururipe, but I 


THE OIL-BEARING SHALES OF THE COAST OF BRAZIL. 15 


do not know the western limits of the series in that direction 
except near the Rio Sao Francisco. 

Where the shales are exposed about the east side of the Bay of 
Bahia they bear the strongest possible resemblance to the 
oil-hearing shales of Alagoas. I am not aware of any ex¬ 
amination or attempted working of the oil-shales near the city of 
Bahia or on the island of Itaparica. Turfa beds, however, are 
reported from the northern part of the island of Tinhare, 40 
kilometers south of Bahia, and from Rio Itahipe in south 
latitude 14° 44'.*' 

The turfa beds on Rio Marahu, just south of the Bay of 
Camamu, and 115 kilometers south of the city of Bahia, have 
been known for many years, and the material has been much 
isss-talked about in Brazil. Hartt says of this turfa :f 


Fig. 10. 



Ideal Section from Maceio to Albuquerque along the Alagoas Kailway (35 kilom.), Showing 

the Eocene Sediments Overlying the Crystalline Rocks. 


“The material burned readily when ignited in a candle, affording an abund¬ 
ant smoky flame.The material appears to be merely a mud impreg¬ 

nated with bitumen, and as it appears to exist in large quantities, it would be very 
valuable for gas-making or the manufacture of kerosene.” 


Hartt quotes from Mr. Aicolay to the effect that the Camamu 
series does not appear to be in any way connected with that of 
Bahia or with those of the south, unless, as has been reported, 
turfa is found in the Rio de Contas. This series, it is said, may 
be designated as follows: 

“In a basin of gneissose rocks are bituminous schists, sands and marls con¬ 
taining fossils (fresh-water?), and, it is presumable, above that, the turfa.” 

* Henrique Praguer in the Revista do Instituto Geographico da Bahia, vol. 
iv, p. 429. 

f Geology and Physical Geography of Brazil. By Chas. Fred. Hartt. Boston, 
1870. pp. 263-4. In quoting Hartt I have substituted turfa , the word used by 
the Brazilians, for the turba erroneously used by him. 



































16 THE OIL-BEARING SHALES OF THE COAST OF BRAZIL. 


Mr. Hicolay gives the following section of a shaft put down 
in the turfa district.* 


Ft. 

20 

3 

4 
0 
0 
1 
1 
2 
2 

12 

15 

45 


Section of Shaft in Turf a District. 


In. 

0 

0 

o 

9 

9 

6 

6 

6 

0 

0 

0 

0 


Clayey and sandy shales. 
Bituminous clay. 

Ferruginous sandstone. 

Shale with lignite. 

Bituminous stratum. 

Micaceous shale. 

Shale with lignite and bitumen. 
Slialy strata. 

Bituminous strata. 

Shalv rocks. 

Bituminous strata. 

Gneissose rocks. 


108 feet. 


Within a few years the oil-sliale deposits of Marahu passed 
into the hands of a company controlling abundant means, and 
the most extravagant preparations were made to manufacture 
soap, paraffine, various kinds of oils, and I know not what. 
A town was built about the extensive factories; vast quantities 
of expensive machinery and supplies of every kind were im¬ 
ported from England; and the establishment started operations 
on a scale out of all proportion to the possibilities of the mar¬ 
ket. As might have been expected, the whole business col¬ 
lapsed within a few months, and much of the machinery is 
now rusting in the mud of the mangrove swamps, and the 
empty houses are being devoured by white ants* I believe 
this is the only effort that has been made to utilize the oil-bear¬ 
ing shales of Brazil. It is to be regretted that the business 
was not conducted in a more conservative manner, for after 
so colossal a failure other companies will hesitate to embark 
in any enterprise that attempts to utilize the oil-shales of Brazil. 

It is worth noting, however, that the Brazilian government 
affords all the “ protection ” that any industry can reasonably 
ask in the way of high import-duties, and if it is found that 
these shales can be utilized, import-duties will be freely laid 
upon all the products that can be made from them. 


* In giving this section I have altered the wording somewhat to express the 
evident meaning of Mr. Nicolay ; he uses the words schist and schistose where shale 
and shaly are meant. 








THE OIL-BEARING SHALES OF TIIE COAST OF BRAZIL. 17 

Resume. The oil-shales of the Brazilian coast are of Tertiary 
age, and the parti-colored beds exposed in the bluffs along 
that coast are for the most part the weathered portions of this 
same series. The Tertiary strata rest upon granites, gneisses 
and other crystalline rocks, with a bed of very coarse conglomer¬ 
ates forming the base ot the series. The only known exception 
to this is in the Serra d’ltabaiana, in the State of Sergipe, where 
there is a series of Cretaceous beds with older beds between the 
granites and the Cretaceous, that appear to be Paleozoic, though 
no fossils have been found in them. The failure of the Marahu 
Company was evidently due to extravagance and mismanage¬ 
ment, and cannot be regarded as a sufficient reason for con¬ 
demning the oil-shales of Brazil as unworkable. 

The total thickness of the Tertiary beds does not much 
exceed the total thickness of the mottled and parti-colored beds 
exposed on the coast—that is, from 30 to 90 meters (100 to 300 
feet). This is shown by the fact that at many places the basal 
conglomerates are exposed, while at several points the crystal¬ 
line rocks themselves are uncovered. 

Xo oil-shales are now known in Pernambuco, Parahyba, Bio 
Grande do Xorte, Sergipe or Espirito Santo; but they may be 
expected in any of those States within the Tertiary area. 


Postscript. 

When this paper was sent to the Secretary the oil-bearing 
beds referred to were set down as Cretaceous; and they are so 
classified in the pamphlet edition. This was done because the 
sediments of the Bahia basin had been accepted as Cretaceous 
without question since the publication of Hartt's book* in 
1870. An examination of the paleontologic evidence, how¬ 
ever, fails to reveal any satisfactory reason for this correlation. 
There are true Cretaceous beds in the State of Sergipe, just 
north of Bahia; but they are marine deposits, with a rich fossil 
fauna, and are not connected with the fresh-water beds of the 
Bahia basin. The marine sediments at Pernambuco, Maria 
Farinha, Itamaraca, Parahyba, Piabas, and other intermediate 
points along the coast, which were supposed to be Cretaceous, 


* “ Geology and Physical Geography of Brazil,” by C. F. Hartt, Boston, 1870. 




18 TIIE OIL-BEARING SHALES OF THE COAST OF BRAZIL. 


turn out to be Eocene Tertiary. Upon this subject I have asked 
the views of Dr. Gilbert D. Harris, of Cornell University, one 
of our best authorities on the Eocene, who writes: 

“ I can assure you most emphatically that neither in that work [Dr. White’s 
report upon the Brazilian Mesozoic fossils], nor in our specimens [at Cornell Uni¬ 
versity], nor in those I have seen in the United States National Museum from 
Maria Farinha, can I find a trace of any fauna other than the Midway Eocene.” 


An examination in 1899 of the geology of the coast, from 
Natal, State of Rio Grande do Norte, to the southern part of 
the State of Bahia, led me to the conclusion that the highly- 
colored beds of the coast (Pernambuco, Maria Farinha, Para- 
hyba, Alagoas, etc.) were approximately of the same age as the 
fresh-water beds of the Bahia basin. If this is correct, then 
the Bahia basin is Eocene Tertiary, instead of Cretaceous. In 
calling them Tertiary, however, we are but going back to their 
earlier classification by Darwin* in 1841, by Pissis in 1842,f 
and to the age suggested by the Entomostraca described from 
Baliia by Professor T. Rupertjin 1859. £ 


The requisite corrections hive been accordingly made in the 
text of the pamphlet edition lof this paper, before the present 
republication of it. 

Geological Observations,” by C larlesDarwin, 2ded., p. 193, London, 1876. 


* “ 


t Mem. sur la position geologique des erraines de la partie australe du Bresil , etc., 
par M. A. Pissis. (Pr6sent6 a FAcadimie des Sciences, le 27 Jilin, 1842.) 

Quar. Jour. Geol. Soc., December J4, 1859, xvi., 266-268. 

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